Manning was acquitted of the aiding the enemy charge — the most serious charge he faced — but was convicted by a military judge on all but one of the lesser counts he was charged with. He now faces a potential sentence of up to 136 years in prison.

Text Size

-

+

reset

“Bradley Manning’s alleged disclosures have exposed war crimes, sparked revolutions, and induced democratic reform. He is the quintessential whistleblower,” Assange said. “This is the first ever espionage conviction against a whistleblower. It is a dangerous precedent and an example of national security extremism. It is a short sighted judgment that can not be tolerated and must be reversed. It can never be that conveying true information to the public is ‘espionage.’”

Assange said President Obama praised whistleblowers in his 2008 campaign, but has since betrayed that platform. He said there was a lack of any individual who came to harm as a result of Manning’s disclosures.

“The only ‘victim’ was the [U.S.] government’s wounded pride, but the abuse of this fine young man was never the way to restore it,” he said. “Rather, the abuse of Bradley Manning has left the world with a sense of disgust at how low the Obama administration has fallen. It is not a sign of strength, but of weakness.”

Assange concluded his statement by saying that this did not represent a fair trial, and that the Obama administration is “intent on weakening the freedom of the press.”

“The Obama administration has been chipping away democratic freedoms in the United States. With today’s verdict, Obama has hacked off much more. The administration is intent on deterring and silencing whistleblowers, intent on weakening freedom of the press,” he said. “The US first amendment states that ‘Congress shall make no law… abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press’. What part of ‘no’ does Barack Obama fail to comprehend?”